Blog Posts Brody Likes

Flowcharts lay out the process for solving problems in a logical, step-by-step manner. According to this flowchart, the wizard Gandalf the Grey uses perfectly logical reasoning, at least according to the folks at the LOTR Project. Link -via Flowing Data

This rubbery-looking bookcase is made from firm oak plywood. It's one of many wonderful, oddly-shaped bookcases made by Scott Blackwell. This Dali-esque piece, Blackwell would like for you to know, comes with a free melting clock.

He doesn't know how thin the ice is, and he doesn't care. I don't have any information on this vehicle, but it's apparently a real all-terrain vehicle, with "terrain" including water. Pretty lightweight, with oversized tires that are basically flotation devices. -via Daily Picks and Flicks

Well, they are monsters, after all. Kelsey Wailes, known across the internet as Eat Toast, reminds us that occasionally anime is unrealistic. I'm jealous: the Pikachu was given away at a Secret Santa event.

Looking to get your Futurama drink on? Then try chugging some of Mom's Old Fashioned Robot Oil as instructed by The Insatiable Geek. Fortunately, their version shouldn't be so deadly for humans as most real oil as it's just made with dark beer and Jagermeister.

The character Big Daddy from the video game Bioshock was rendered in LEGO bricks by Pate-keetongu. I love his explanation of the build.

There is a lot of SNOT in the torso. Okay, there is lot of it everywhere. But I'm happy with the shapes of the torso, the hunchback look and the suture between the head and the upper torso.The arms were probably easiest parts to build, save the simple canisters on the back. Ball joint are just so much easier to play with than the clicky joints.

SNOT is a builder's acronym meaning Studs Not On Top. But the picture that line brought up in your mind initially is much funnier! Read the rest at Cyclopic Bricks. Link -via Laughing Squid

As you might be aware, if you’ve been online or watched any television over the last month, the long-awaited Hobbit movie is finally in theaters and while plenty of people are talking about the movie, we’re here to talk about its inspiration, the classic Tolkien novel, The Hobbit, or There and Back Again. So grab your second breakfast and sit back and relax because there’s plenty to talk about when it comes to this classic children’s book.

Tolkien Started to Create Middle Earth Long Before He Thought Up The Story

While plenty of fantasy authors create mythologies to work with their characters and their plot lines, Tolkien, who had an academic background in Germanic and Norse language and religions, instead started creating a mythology and elven languages in 1917 -long before he ever thought about the characters that would later star in his stories.

He didn’t even start to think about hobbits until the early 1930’s, when a sentence popped into his head as he was grading some tests. He immediately scribbled down the words, “In a hole in the ground lived a hobbit” and within a few years, he finished the story.

He Didn’t Even Send the Manuscript to a Publisher

After finishing The Hobbit, Tolkien sent it to few friends and colleagues to review, including a student named Elaine Griffiths. In 1936, Elaine was talking to Susan Dagnall, who worked for a publishing company, when she recommended that Susan take a look at the manuscript. Susan was impressed with the work and gave it to Stanley Unwin, the head of publishing house George Allen and Unwin. Stanley gave the book to his 10 year-old to review, as he was the target age for the title, and the boy’s positive review led to the publishers deciding to print the book.

By 1935, the game of Monopoly--including the name--had formed. Two years later, Parker Brothers included die-cast metal player pieces, including a car, a top hat, an iron, a shoe and a thimble, in Monopoly sets. Why? Eddie Deezen asked John Chaneski, an expert on board games:

When Monopoly was first created in the early 1930s, there were no pieces like we know them, so they went to Cracker Jack, which at the time was offering tiny metal tchotchkes, like cars. They used the same molds to make the Monopoly pieces. Game Show sells some antique Cracker Jack prizes and, sure enough, the toy car is exactly the same as the Monopoly car. In fact, there’s also a candlestick, which seems to be the model for the one in Clue. [...]

I think they chose Cracker Jack prizes that symbolize wealth and poverty. The car, top hat, and dog (especially a little terrier like Asta, then famous from “The Thin Man” movie series) were all possessions of the wealthy. The thimble, wheelbarrow, old shoe, and iron were possessions or tools of the poor.

My Neighbor Totoro is a pretty surreal movie, but you probably didn't know is that it is actually based on a real creature, which can be seen above. Personally, I think Yun Yun is even cuter than the one in the cartoon.

Sleepy Skunk edited together clips from the movies of 2012 into one supercut. How many of them did you see? Since he used the trailers, even those to be released in December are included. See a list of the films at his site. Link -via Buzzfeed

Tonya Herron is one of the many entrants of National Geographic's annual photography contest. She snapped this picture of a Great White Shark in False Bay, South Africa. Did the little seal make it? I don't know, but the title of the photo is "The Great Escape." You can find other excellent submissions at the link.

New Zealand, as you may know by now, is actually Middle-Earth. The whole country is going full fanboy over the premier of The Hobbit, even going so far as to describe the weather in the Elvish language. Here's local weatherelf Tamati Coffey at work.

During the 1890s, a German woman named Agnes Richter was institutionalized for a mental illness. She wasn't allowed to use conventional writing instruments, but she was allowed to sew. Richter was a good seamstress, so she embroidered hundreds of mysterious words and phrases on a straightjacket. Gail Hornstein, a psychologist, wrote a book about her exploration of this unique artifact and what it reveals about Richter's mind.

Only 1% of employers in the US offer this perk, but the number is growing. In some firms, employees can take as much paid time off as they feel they need:

By showing that they trust their workers, these employers say, they are cultivating a culture of even deeper trust. Though the practice is still experimental, these companies say they've seen little abuse of the system so far. [...]

Dov Seidman, chief executive officer of advisory-services firm LRN, acknowledges that since the company implemented unlimited vacation three years ago, some workers have "made the wrong decision" and missed meetings to take time off. Still, such mistakes are rare, he says, and "no one's ever gone for four weeks."

Mr. Seidman says his roughly 300 employees have become more thoughtful and considerate about taking time off as a result of the policy. Many of them now feel compelled to check in with their peers before scheduling vacations, he says.

This is a brilliant idea--one that will surely be adopted by farsighted, ingenious corporate visionaries. Of course, I'm thinking of Neatorama CEO Alex Santoso, a business giant of our age who has the entrepreneurial intuition to seize this opportunity immediately.

TheBjorkDork's full sleeve tattoo brings us the entire Planetary Express experience at once. Her work was presumably sponsored by Slurm, as you can see an advertisement for the drink on the inside of her elbow.

In this video, titled An Unexpected Briefing, Air New Zealand partnered
with WETA Workshop (which created
special effects for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey as well as The Lord
of the Rings series). It features cameos by film director Peter Jackson,
Dean O'Gorman (Fili the Dwarf), Royd Tolkien (great grandson of J.R.R.
Tolkien), and even Gollum.

Just because you've filled up your dog's food dish every day for his entire life is no reason to conclude that you'll do so tomorrow. This and other terrors from the mind of Jeff Wysaski are sure to give your pets nightmares.

ModPrimate and Whitney adopted a American Pit Bull Terrier/Boxer mix. The new puppy is pretty happy to have a home and a family and lots of toys to play with. Ecstatic, actually. He's four months old in the video. By next year, he'll be the size of a house! -via I Have Seen The Whole Of The Internet